


A Very Punchable Face, Indeed

by WriteItOtt



Category: Good Omens (TV), Good Omens - Neil Gaiman & Terry Pratchett
Genre: "Are You Sure I Can't Break His Nose?", Aziraphale Loves His Friends, BAMF Aziraphale (Good Omens), Best Friends, Big Blue Eyed Puppy Dog Look, But Not In The Usual Way, Cinnamon Roll Newton Pulsifer, Crowley to the Rescue (Good Omens), Gen, Prompt Fill, Protective Aziraphale (Good Omens)
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-08-03
Updated: 2020-08-03
Packaged: 2021-03-06 00:48:21
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 5,153
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/25694533
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/WriteItOtt/pseuds/WriteItOtt
Summary: A different take on the BAMF Aziraphale and Crowley to the Rescue tags.Aziraphale gets protective of his human friends while helping Newt with a favor, stands up for service industry workers, and somehow still winds up needing to call Crowley to come and rescue him.
Relationships: Anathema Device/Newton Pulsifer, Aziraphale & Crowley (Good Omens), Aziraphale (Good Omens) & Newton Pulsifer
Comments: 16
Kudos: 53
Collections: Week 24: Punch Him A Little





	A Very Punchable Face, Indeed

**Author's Note:**

> Created for the Ao3 Fanfiction Readers and Writers group, for the following prompt:
> 
> "Are you sure I can't punch him in the face?"  
> "Yes."  
> "What if I just break his nose a little?"
> 
> CW: mild homophobic incident in a shop, verbal abuse of a service industry worker, non-violent encounter with a policeman

“So how _exactly_ did you end up arrested, Angel?” Crowley asked him incredulously, peering between the bars of the holding cell.

“Well… I… er,” the angel stammered, wringing his hands in front of himself and unable to look his best friend in the eye.

“Aziraphale…” Crowley growled. “C’mon, out with it.”

“I p-pun -- _Ipunchedamaninthenose_!” he hissed all at once, a deep blush coloring his face and ears.

“ _You wot_?!”

“You heard me!”

“Angel…” the demon breathed in either awe or concern; even Crowley himself wasn’t sure which it was. His amber eyes were wide as saucers behind his glasses and his auburn brows seemed determined to disappear into his hairline with how high up his forehead they had crept. Truly, something serious must have happened to have driven _Aziraphale_ \- of all people! - to actually inflict violence upon another person! “How - wha - _why_?!” he finally managed to ask.

Aziraphale, for his part, still looked halfway between indignant and appalled with a healthy dose of sheepish and embarrassed thrown in for good measure. “I didn’t mean to!” he wailed quietly. “It… it just happened! He was so insufferably _rude_ and the good shop-lady didn’t deserve that sort of treatment! And - and he challenged me to hit him if I dared or ‘butt out and mind my own business’ and I… well, he had a very punchable face!”

Crowley gaped at his incarcerated friend, blinking as if it were the first time he was seeing the celestial being. It took nearly a full minute for the demon’s brain to come back online and form a thought after the angel’s ‘explanation’ and almost another full minute for that thought to become coherent speech and his mouth to spit it out.

“‘A very… punchable face’?” He took a few moments to blink again and shake his head in disbelief. “I think you should start at the beginning, Aziraphale…”

“Oh, but can’t that wait until we’re _home_?” Aziraphale whined and turned his greatest weapon on his best friend: the Big Blue-Eyed Puppy Dog Look.

Crowley knew he was beaten as soon as he heard the whining tone in the angel’s voice but still couldn’t help but look up for The Look. Most people, if asked, would say the Principality’s most effective weapon against his demonic adversary was the flaming sword given to him in order to guard the Eastern Gate of the Garden of Eden. However, after 6000 years of being thwarted by and spending time with said Principality, Crowley knew far better. The Serpent of Eden had long since stopped worrying about the sword and started worrying about The Look that could quite effectively stop him in his very tracks. Even after 6000 years The Look was just as effective now as it had been the first time and Crowley sighed a very put-upon sigh when he saw it this time.

“Yes, yes, alright; stop it with The Look,” he grumbled affectionately, turning away from the holding cell and facing the constable across the room. “The things I do for you…”

With a snap of his fingers the constable froze much like Sister Mary Loquacious had done several months earlier at Tadfield Manor. Crowley strolled up to the hapless official and proclaimed, “You fell asleep at your desk after a sleepless night at home. You will wake up having dreamed about responding to an incident at a flower shop and arresting a man for punching another man for being rude to the shopkeeper. This dream was so very vivid that you even started to fill out the paperwork for the arrest before realizing it was all a dream, then you’ll have a good laugh with your mates about it. You’ll find that one of them had a very similar dream about dispatching you to a shop for an incident of assault, then have another good laugh about having drunk too much at the bar the night before and the silly dreams hard liquor seems to bring on for the both of you.”

The hardest part completed, Crowley snatched the officer’s keyring from his belt and began trying to find the one that fit the lock on the holding cell door. Impatient and wanting nothing more than to be over and done with the entire embarrassing affair, Aziraphale snapped and unlocked the door, strolling out of the cell and back to freedom under the baleful glare of his companion. The ginger tossed the keys onto the constable’s desk with a huff.

“Are we going to my flat or yours?” he asked, one brow raised.

“Oh! Well, I think I’d rather like a stiff drink and the comfort of a certain overstuffed armchair by the fire after the… excitement... of my morning,” the angel replied, studiously not looking at Crowley as he did. He could just about feel the demon’s smug look boring into the side of his head as it was; he didn’t need to actually _see_ it too.

Crowley was, in fact, staring pointedly at the angel while he spoke, fondness and exasperation creating a symphony of microexpressions across his angular face as the two emotions fought for pride of place on his features. “Alright, Angel. Then you’re going to tell me just how this all happened,” he conceded and snapped his fingers again to take them back to the bookshop.

***********

**_Three and one-half hours earlier_ **

Aziraphale simply loved early spring. Flowers, trees, and green things started to shake off the dormancy of the winter and people began to be out and about more often, it seemed, as if all of God’s earthly creations were finally realizing there was indeed hope for better weather and felt the need to come out of their homes and commune with each other in joy. The weather this winter had been particularly _English_ , he thought, full of rain, sleet, and slush that froze into dangerous puddles overnight to trip and trap hapless pedestrians as they went about their business. His feelings on the winter, of course, had nothing to do with the number of times he himself had been trapped by what appeared to be nothing more than some slush on the sidewalk but turned out to be slick ice that tumbled him quite ungently to the ground in a mortifying display of gracelessness and left a clinging dampness to his wool trousers for the rest of the day; why would you even ask?

Perhaps it was the effects of the albeit weak but still hopeful early spring sunshine getting to him, but Aziraphale was determined to find a lovely new plant for Crowley today. He hadn’t heard Crowley talk about his plants in quite some weeks now, so he thought maybe he had had to destroy more than usual for leaf spots or some other such gardening-related slight to the demon’s honour. Even if that weren’t true, the angel reasoned that his plant-loving friend would appreciate a new addition to his lovely plant room nonetheless, and since he was to meet dear Newton today to help the boy pick an appropriate bouquet for ‘an important reason’, buying Crowley a new plant fit quite well into his schedule, regardless of the reason.

He also suspected he knew what Newton’s ‘important reason’ was, but he wouldn’t think of outright asking the lad to confirm his suspicions; after all, Newt continually got flustered by being asked for his order at a restaurant. The poor man might discorporate from a direct question about his relationship with Anathema…

Aziraphale shook his head fondly at the thought of his human friend and, as if on cue, the bell above the shop door tinkled to alert the bookseller of his friend’s arrival. “In the back, Newton, my dear fellow!” he called from his desk. “I was just finishing up a spot of bookkeeping before we venture out on today’s quest.”

Newt smiled as he made his way deeper into the now-familiar shop. “Oh, are you sure you don’t need more time? I’d hate to interrupt important work,” he asked, nervously taking another step away from Aziraphale’s desk when he saw the computer sitting on it.

“Oh no, I’m just… about… done!” he announced brightly. The blond capped his fountain pen with a wiggle and stood up from his desk, opening his arms in invitation for a hug to greet his friend properly.

Newt grinned and hugged the angel immediately. They had grown rather close after the end of the world didn’t happen, bonding over their mutual love of numbers, books, and long philosophical discussions on obscure topics that hardly anyone else around them could follow for very long. For Newt in particular, it was rather freeing to have a friend who could fix the worst results of his luck and had rather come out of his shell in recent months between dating and moving in with Anathema and his friendship with Aziraphale.

“I do appreciate your help, Aziraphale,” the human smiled as he stepped back from the hug. “I just… I don’t want to mess this up. It’s… it’s quite important to me,” Newt added shyly.

“Oh, pish, my dear boy! Of course I’ll help you! And you couldn’t _really_ mess up romance,” Aziraphale replied with a conspiratorial little half-smile. “Those moments just become fond memories to reminisce about later.”

A brilliant crimson flush spread up Newt’s neck and across his surprised face at the angel’s spot-on statement. He sputtered a few times before finally managing, “H-how did you know?”

“You and Anathema are made for each other, my boy; that has been clear since that fateful day in Tadfield,” Aziraphale chuckled, pulling on his wool coat and a warm tartan scarf.

Overcome with emotion, Newt practically flung himself at Aziraphale and hugged the blond man tightly when his words got stuck in his throat. “Thank you so much,” he whispered into the angel’s shoulder, squeezing him again before letting go and standing up straight (ish) again. “I’m proposing to her tonight. I have it all set up thanks to the Them. I just… I want to present her with a bouquet that… well, that shows her how I see her, you know?” he explained, stumbling a bit over his emotions.

“Oh my boy… that’s beautiful!” Aziraphale sighed wistfully and smiled at the man. “I do think I know just what you mean, and I am so very honoured that you came to me to help you with it.”

“Well, you’re my closest friend,” Newt stammered, shuffling his feet a bit and not looking directly at Aziraphale. “I had… had hoped you would be my… my best man, if she says yes, that is…” he added in a rush.

Aziraphale managed - albeit just barely - to contain his excited squeal at Newt’s revelation, and instead let out a gasp as he wrapped the younger man in a bear-hug once more. “Of course I will! Oh, my dear friend…” he laughed and let go of Newt with a beaming grin. “I know she’ll say yes; how could she not? Anathema is a very intelligent woman and she’s just as in love with you as you are with her,” the angel continued happily.

Newt let out a breath of relief and laughed along with Aziraphale as he was spun around in another hug and set on his feet gently. “I hope you’re right,” he chuckled, although he couldn’t help but feel more confident with his friend’s assessment out in the open. “So, er… where is it we’re going? You said you knew a florist?”

Aziraphale’s eyes lit up at that and he bustled to the front of the shop to pull the blinds and flip the sign to closed, locking the door behind Newt once they were outside. “Yes! The shop is just around the block actually. The Harmons own and run it together; Helen is the florist and gardening expert and her wife Meg is an event planner,” he explained.

“Oh, that’s convenient then,” Newt pondered aloud. “Maybe I’ll be back with Anathema to talk about a wedding later…”

Both men shared a look and laughed as Newt’s hopeful joy spilled over into the angel and Aziraphale looped it right back, unable to help himself in his happiness for his friends. The blond opened the door of an ornately painted shop with a sign that proclaimed it to be called ‘Morning Glories and Poppycocks’ and gestured for Newt to enter politely. A kindly-looking middle-aged woman with red hair shot with silver and green eyes smiled at the two of them and came around the counter, wiping her hands on her apron before greeting Aziraphale with a warm hug.

“Mr. Fell, what a pleasure to see you!” she said with a grin. She turned to offer Newt her hand to shake with the same warm expression. “I’m Helen, the resident florist,” the exuberant woman introduced herself.

“Newton, but you can just call me Newt,” the young man answered, shaking her hand. “Aziraphale told me you might be able to help me…” He looked over at his friend in the universal introvert expression of ‘please help me’. Aziraphale took pity on the poor boy and piped up.

“It’s always a pleasure to come visit, Helen,” he chuckled warmly. “Today though, we’re on a very important mission. Newt here is going to propose to his girlfriend tonight and wants to craft a bouquet for her that showcases how he sees her, and I knew just the artist to bring him to,” the angel beamed at her.

“Oh, how romantic!” the petite woman gushed. “Were you thinking of choosing the blooms by looks or by association? Flower language?” Helen clarified when Newt just looked at her in wide-eyed confusion.

Newt blinked and looked rather overwhelmed. “There’s a flower language?”

Aziraphale shook his head and rolled his eyes playfully at his friend. “Somebody, give me strength…” he sighed. “Yes, my dear boy, certain associations and sentiments have been attributed to, oh, just about every variety of plant you can imagine for hundreds of years. The Victorian era, however, is when speaking with flower arrangements was perfected, you might say.”

“Oh!” Newt looked as though the proverbial lightbulb had at last illuminated in his brain and nodded his understanding. “Ana has talked about that before, now that you mention it. I didn’t really follow it before, but I trust the experts?” he conceded, smiling between Helen and Aziraphale.

Helen’s face lit up at Newt’s understanding and clapped her hands excitedly. Grabbing the hesitant man’s hand the florist guided Newt through the racks and displays of vibrant blooms and verdant greenery, launching into the explanation of each one’s meaning as she pointed them out. Aziraphale was quite chuffed to watch Newt’s hesitancy turn to enthusiasm for his project and his attentive concentration while Helen taught him and made suggestions. He noticed the bell above the door chimed behind him and glanced over his shoulder in curiosity. The man who had entered certainly didn’t look pleased, his mouth pursed in a tight frown and his eyes downright sharp as they searched the shop.

“You work here?” The man didn’t so much as ask the question as spit it venomously at Aziraphale like an accusation. Aziraphale’s brows rose and he bristled with annoyance at the man’s gruff and angry tone of voice.

“No, I do not. And I’m certain that the lady who does would appreciate you addressing those in her shop with a much more respectful and kindly tone,” he replied with as much frostiness as he could muster. Really, the manners of some people…

The man scoffed at Aziraphale’s answer, his beady eyes giving the shorter blond man a dismissive once-over. The gesture very much reminded Aziraphale of a small hawk deciding whether or not to steal a larger bird’s lunch. Staring down the tall human with an icy blue gaze the angel silently decided that, if that were indeed the case, the man would discover he had made an unfortunate miscalculation in challenging Aziraphale, just like the ‘meemee’ Crowley had shown him recently of a small kestrel attempting to steal a Harris hawk’s kill. Bad at math, indeed.

Just like the animal Aziraphale had been comparing him to, the man puffed up his chest and drew himself up to his full height in an effort to intimidate the other man and inhaled to speak again. Aziraphale simply held his prim but ready posture and continued to observe the man cooly, one platinum brow raised in the universal expression of ‘try me’. Fortunately for the angry man Helen chose that moment to intervene in the situation, sliding up next to Aziraphale with the plastered-on smile that all customer service workers were well-versed in.

“Oh, pardon me for interrupting, sirs, but is there something I can help you with?” she said brightly, smoothing over the obvious tension between the two men with the talent of long-time service workers the world over.

Judging by the sour look he tossed over Helen’s head at Aziraphale, the man clearly thought about ignoring the out the florist had so gracefully provided but must have decided the ponce of a man in front of him wasn’t worth any more of his time. With another indignant huff and a dismissive flick of his whiskered chin the man turned to Helen and raised the vase of beautifully arranged flowers he had previously held at his side in one large, meaty hand.

“Yeah, there’s something, all right,” he sneered. He shook the vase nearly in Helen’s face as he blustered onward. “Just look at this mess! It’s not _at all_ what I ordered! I can’t give this to my mother!”

Aziraphale looked between the gorgeous bouquet and the florist with a pointed expression but held his tongue and decided to simply walk away from the insufferably rude man. If Helen needed help dealing with the lout he was certain both Newton and himself would intervene for her, however, he didn’t doubt the feisty florist’s ability one bit. Quietly, the angel sidled away from the confrontation to rejoin Newt on the other side of the shop.

“Yeah that’s right, better stick to your little boyfriend over there,” the man scoffed at Aziraphale’s retreat, speaking over Helen entirely as she started to apologize and offer to rectify his complaint.

Aziraphale watched Newt’s eyes go wide in shock at the not-at-all-subtle barb, his gaze flicking nervously between the blond and the irate man. The angel was quite proud of himself for not allowing the man the satisfaction of getting a rise out of him and simply kept his back to the cretin as he pretended to look through a display of sunflowers and daffodils. After a few moments the angry man turned his attention back to Helen and Newt turned around to ‘look’ through the blooms with Aziraphale.

“What on earth is wrong with him?” Newt hissed under his breath. “That arrangement is beautiful!”

“I can’t even _begin_ to imagine, my dear boy, but he had better change his tone toward Helen if he knows what’s good for him,” the angel whispered back. He took a surreptitious glance back over his shoulder to check on the scene unfolding at the counter. It certainly wasn’t pretty.

“I _specifically_ asked for lavender, baby’s breath, and white roses! Do these roses look white to you?” the man spat at the florist. “No! They’re bloody pink! Since when is pink the same as white?”

Helen, for her part, remained cool and aloof as the large man loomed across the counter at her and continued to yell. Aziraphale and Newt were both quietly impressed as they pretended not to watch over their shoulders. When the lout seemed to have blustered himself out of venom for the moment, Helen calmly spoke.

“Are you quite finished, “sir”, or shall I let you rant for another few minutes?”

The man’s reaction was instantaneous. His bushy brows shot up toward his receding hairline while his walrus-like mustache fairly bristled at the audacious display of sarcasm from the woman waiting on him. “How - How _dare_ you?!” he bellowed, red-faced and furious now. “I’ve never been so - so _disrespected_ by a _clerk_ in all my _life_! I _demand_ to speak to the manager! This - this is _outrageous_! The sheer _audacity_!”

With the patience of a saint, Helen waited once again for the surly lout to tire himself out and pause in his tirade. When he did she smiled that plastic service smile and told him with all the saccharine sweetness she had, “There is no manager, sir, but I **am** the owner.”

Aziraphale and Newt both snorted behind their hands and hastily attempted to cover up their laughter by turning it into a sneeze and a cough, respectively. The angel nudged his friend and leaned in to hiss in his ear, “Do you think a good punch in the nose would set right whatever it is that’s obviously gone wonky in his head, or would I just be wasting everyone’s time?”

Newt turned his answering snort of a giggle into another cough and hissed back, “You’re right, of course, but you _definitely_ shouldn’t do that. I’ve seen how strong you are; you’d turn him into jelly… Not to mention that’s assault.”

The blond gave a rather dramatic sigh and rolled his eyes at Newt’s practical advice. “Are you sure I can’t punch him in the face? What about the stomach? Throat?” he whined somewhat playfully.

“No! I mean… yes, I’m sure!” Newt hissed and elbowed him sharply.

Really, the man _certainly_ deserved it, the way he was carrying on. From what Aziraphale had gathered from the limited information Helen was able to get out between being interrupted and bellowed over, the florist had called the man’s home to inquire about substituting pink roses for the white he had initially ordered and the man’s own wife had given enthusiastic permission for it. In fact, according to Helen’s recounting of the phone call, Mrs. Surly had said that her mother-in-law _loved_ pink roses and they were actually her favorite. Mr. Surly, however, enthusiastically insisted (bellowed) that _he_ was the one who ordered the arrangement and that Helen had had no right to listen to anyone but him on the matter of the substitution, and ‘how dare she insinuate that he didn’t know his own mother’s favorite flower’.

Aziraphale glared daggers at the man’s irate display and elbowed Newt back. “What if I just break his nose a little?”

“Oh, for Heaven’s sake! **_NO_**!”

Unable to ignore the stifled but still quite obvious snorts of giggles from the portly blond and his companion, Mr. Surly spun on his heel to confront the other men.

“Oi! Laughing behind my back, eh? How very brave of you,” Surly mocked them, throwing a sneer in for good measure. He crossed the room in measured, lumbering thuds meant to intimidate his opponents and got right in Aziraphale’s stony face. “I’ve had just about enough of you, ya fat little ponce. Why don’t you just take your stringbean twink here and **_bugger off_**!”

“Mr. Cranston! That is _enough_!” Helen fumed, her emerald eyes flashing dangerously as she came around the counter and advanced on the men in the corner. “It’s one thing if you want to carry on and scream at _me_ but I will _not_ have you harassing either my customers _or_ my friends in _my_ shop! If you don’t leave _right now_ , I will be calling the police!”

Aziraphale knew better.

Newt had told him no, his _brain_ had told him no…

… but the angel’s oft-overlooked combat training decided that now was the time to remind this bigot of just whom he was shouting at. The angel’s well-manicured fist collided with Mr. Cranston’s nose with a satisfying _crunch_ and gasps from the rest of the humans in the shop. As Aziraphale had mused to Newt earlier, the previously-irate man fell to the floor and seemed to find a new attitude as he curled in on himself and clutched at his quite broken nose, whining and sniffling back pitiful tears.

“You hit me! You actually _hit_ me!” he whined. Aziraphale wasn’t certain whether it was intentional or as a result of the new shape of the man’s nose but was annoyed by the whining nonetheless.

“Oh, _do_ shut up, you pompous twit,” the angel growled back, examining the state of his manicure. Satisfied that nothing was chipped, Aziraphale loomed over the prone man and pinned him with a gaze like a stormy sea. “You come in here ranting and raving, spewing your _disgusting_ homophobia and throwing a temper tantrum fit for a teething toddler, and are genuinely surprised to have driven someone to hit you? I mean, _honestly_ …” he scoffed, “You can’t _possibly_ be that stupid! I would be willing to bet this is _hardly_ the first time you’ve incited violence, although one could hope that you don’t make a habit of driving non-violent men to the breaking point of their very beliefs!”

The furious angel paused for a moment to take several calming breaths and swept his stormy gaze around the shop to take in the rest of the witnesses. Newt was staring open-mouthed and wide-eyed in either shock or awe slightly behind the angel’s right shoulder, Helen was in much the same state as Newt but was about 5 or so feet behind Mr. Cranston who was still on the floor clutching his nose and staring up at Aziraphale, and Meg - the other Mrs. Harmon - had come out from her office in the back and was leaning in the doorway with an insouciant smirk that would not have been out of place on Crowley himself. Having banked the hottest flames of his fury, the angel broke the deafening silence in the shop and continued.

“You have insulted and belittled me, disturbed the business of two hard-working and kind women, and more importantly, you have insulted and belittled my friends,” Aziraphale pronounced with a dangerous edge in his voice. Mr. Cranston whimpered but held his tongue when the blond raised his hand to indicate he wasn’t finished yet. “You owe the proprietresses of this establishment a _sincere_ apology, at the _barest_ minimum, and I shall not even request one for myself because I am _well aware_ of just how little an apology from a bully and a bigot like yourself is worth in the grand scheme of things.”

Silence rang heavily again in the verdant shop for nearly a full minute after Aziraphale at last seemed satisfied. The humbled Mr. Cranston scrambled gracelessly to his feet and looked toward-but-not-at Helen and Meg, stumbling through an apology. The man’s speech was full of the typical platitudes - ‘it was a misunderstanding’, ‘he wasn’t truly upset with them, he just took it out on them’ - but it was obvious, at least to the angel, that there was sincerity behind the words.

“I… I’ll just ta-take the arrangement - as is! - and… and just go, shall I?” Cranston mumbled through the handkerchief he had pressed to his bloody nose. He shuffled to the front of the store and hastily grabbed the vase from the counter, retreating to the exit while keeping Aziraphale in his sights all the while. Once the horrible man had left and the bell above the door tinkled a ‘good riddance’ behind him, those left in the shop let out a collective breath and looked at each other in mutual shock.

Meg was the first to recover her words. “Well. That certainly wasn’t a display I expected to see from _you_ , Mr. Fell,” she smirked, walking over to wrap an arm around Helen’s shoulders gently. “But I’m damn glad you were here, at any rate.”

Helen shivered as the adrenaline began to wear off and leaned into her wife’s embrace gratefully. “Yes, God bless you, Mr. Fell,” she nodded emphatically in agreement with Meg’s assessment. “If you hadn’t been here I… well, I just don’t know how that would have ended,” she added with a shaky smile.

Aziraphale smiled slightly at the women and held his arms out to embrace the pair of them together. They both leaned into the hug with soft chuckles from all three of them and Newt as well. “Oh, my dears, I am so sorry you had to deal with that nonsense at all. I know I shouldn’t have hit the brute… I don’t really know what came over me,” he dithered, chuckling again quietly as he looked over at Newt. “And I am sorry I interrupted our mission as well, my dear boy,” he sighed, but Newt waved the apology off with a grin.

“Nah, it was a very worthy interruption, Aziraphale. And I believe Helen and I had decided on the right flowers before the whole _incident_ anyway, right, Helen?”

Both Mrs. Harmons tense postures relaxed with another giggle when Newt effectively broke the tension and Helen nodded her agreement. “Right, Newt! Let’s build your Ana a bouquet she’ll _have_ to say yes to!”

****************

“Now wait just a minute here, Angel!” Crowley frowned over the lip of his whiskey tumbler, the cut crystal vessel paused halfway to his mouth for a sip. “If the arsehole left quietly, how the bloody Heaven did you get arrested?!”

Aziraphale rolled his eyes and gave a heavy sigh at his best friend’s interruption. “I was getting there, my dear. Can’t you be patient even for a story like this?” he teased the serpent.

“Not when the story isn’t making sense and I’m bloody confused,” the serpent shot back with a sarcastic grin.

The angel sipped his own whiskey through an answering smile before he spoke again. “Well, apparently there was a patrolman just up the street when Mr. Cranston left and the bugger went and told him all about how a man had assaulted him in the flower shop and broke his nose, so the patrolman came back and got Helen’s side of the story and then - since the shop’s owner corroborated the assault - I was arrested,” he huffed.

Crowley snorted his sip of whiskey out his own nose, coughing and wheezing with laughter at the sheer ridiculousness of the angel’s story. When he could breathe and speak again, he couldn’t help but ask, “But why didn’t you just miracle yourself out of it, Angel?”

“Because we were out on the sidewalk by that point and there were too many people around rubber-necking at what was going on! I couldn’t very well just _poof_ back to the shop in front of a dozen humans!”

“Yeah, alright; that’s a fair point,” Crowley conceded. “But I have to say… I’m impressed, Angel.” Ever the drama demon, he paused for effect before his face split in a teasing grin and he snorted out, “I never would’ve thought you’d survive prison!”

“Oh, you foul fiend!” Aziraphale threw a decorative cushion at the demon’s head before downing his whiskey and devolving into a fit of laughter together with said fiend.

**Author's Note:**

> TADA! I hope you enjoyed my twist to the BAMF Aziraphale and Crowley to the Rescue tags! When I read the prompt this was the first thing that came to mind and then I sat down and 5000 words later... here we are!
> 
> For anyone wondering, Helen and Meg Harmon are OCs I made up for my work 'Crime Pays, But Not Enough' and they both feature as prominent side characters there (or will when I get that far). 'Crime Pays' is a multi-chapter fic that is still a WIP and I'm currently in the middle of re-working a few plot points before I post the next chapter.
> 
> Kudos, comments, and the like are my lifeblood! Feel free to say hi in the facebook group if you're there too! <3


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